The projective rank of a Hermitian symmetric space: A geometric approach and consequences (Q697370)

Let \(M\) be a connected compact irreducible Hermitian symmetric space. The projective rank \(Pr(M)\) of \(M\) is the maximal complex dimension of the compact totally geodesic complex submanifolds of \(M\) with positive holomorphic bisectional curvature with respect to the induced Kähler metric. The authors present a geometric method for computing the projective rank. A \(\#_2\)-set \(B\) in \(M\) is a set of points in \(M\) with the property that the geodesic symmetry of \(M\) at any point in \(B\) fixes every point in \(B\), and the cardinality of \(B\) is maximal among all subsets of \(M\) with this property. This cardinality is called the \(2\)-number \(\#_2(M)\) of \(M\), which is known to coincide with the Euler-Poincaré characteristic \(\chi(M)\) of \(M\). For each \(\lambda > 0\) denote by \(A_\lambda\) a subset of points in \(B\) of maximal cardinality with the property that the distance between any two different points in \(A_\lambda\) is equal to \(\lambda\). Let \(\gamma\) be the minimum of all distances between two different points in a \(\#_2\)-set of \(M\). The main result is as follows. If \(M \neq Sp(n)/U(n)\) then \(Pr(M) = \#(A_\gamma) - 1\), and if \(M = Sp(n)/U(n)\) then \(Pr(M) = \#(A_{\sqrt{2}\gamma}) - 1\). These numbers can be computed explicitly by using the theory of root space decompositions. As a consequence they obtain the inequality \(Pr(M) rk(M) \leq \#_2(M) = \chi(M)\), where \(rk(M)\) denotes the rank of the symmetric space \(M\).